The Birds and Bees of Wildflowers! Pollination Strategies of Plants All text and photos by Kris H. Light 2005

Transcription

1 The Birds and Bees of Wildflowers! Pollination Strategies of Plants All text and photos by Kris H. Light 2005

2 The Parts of Flowers Petals Stamens Sepals Pistils Strawberry Hedgehog Cactus

3 Boy parts and Girl parts Stamens and Pistils Stigma Style Ovary False Aloe flowers have no petals! Stamens Pistils are the female parts of the flower. They are connected to the ovary where the seeds form. Pollen grains attach to the sticky stigma, then they have to grow a long tube down the style to fertilize the ovules in the ovary. Stamens are the male parts of the flower. They make the pollen grains on the anthers. Stamens often wither and fall off after pollination has occurred.

4 Pollinators Honeybee with Milkweed pollen sacs Pollinators spread pollen from one flower to another Some pollinators include: bees, wasps, ants, beetles, butterflies, moths, bats, hummingbirds, and the wind.

5 Bumblebees have a long tongue for sipping nectar!

6 Passionflower Pollination Ovary See how the pistils and anthers droop to touch the bee s thorax? Pistil Anther

7 View of anthers and pistils from above

8 Petals and Nectar Synandra Guides Petals serve as café signs to attract the pollinators. They are also landing pads for insects. Nectar Guides on the petals are like floral roadmaps, they show the pollinators where to find their sweet reward! These guides can be spots, stripes, or solid colors. Jewelweed Jimsonweed Flame Azalea

9 Ragweed flowers Male flowers Female flowers How is Ragweed Pollinated? The Answer is Blowin in the Wind! Ragweed is an all-toocommon wind-pollinated flower. The male flowers use shotgun effect pollination, dumping millions of pollen grains into the air in an attempt to hit the small pistils on a nearby plant. Ragweed is a monoecious plant, it has both male and female flowers on separate parts of the plant.

10 Colors of Wildflowers and the Pollinators they attract Red Birds, Hummingbirds Orange Butterflies, Hummingbirds Yellow Bees, Bumblebees, Butterflies, Flower flies Green Wind (flies, if a stinky flower) Blue Bees, Bumblebees Purple - Bumblebees Maroon - Beetles, Flies UV Bees and butterflies White - Bees

11 Sessile Trillium Maroon and Brown Flowers attract flies and beetles! Red Erect Trillium Yellowroot Sweet Shrub (Bubby bush) They really stink!!! Wild Ginger

12 Carrionflower REALLY stinks! Female flowers Male flowers You ll often smell Carrionflowers before you see them! They really do smell like a dead animal; they attract flies as their pollinators. These flowers are dioecious; staminate (male) flowers are on one plant and pistillate (female) flowers are on another.

13 Changing Colors Japanese Honeysuckle flowers bloom white the first day, but turn yellow the next day indicating that they have been pollinated.

14 Pistil and Anther Maturity Pistils and anthers mature at different rates in some flowers to prevent selfpollination Pistil Spring Beauty Anthers

15 Composite Flowers Purple-headed Sneezeweed Bearpaw with bumblebee Composite flowers are composed of several to hundreds of small, individual florets. Each floret is a perfect flower, containing the male and female parts and can make a single seed. Daisies, Dandelions, Thistles and Sunflowers are composite flowers. Bees, butterflies, and beetles like these flowers because they offer more bang for the buck!

16 Bowl-shaped Flowers Crocus Virginia Spring Beauty Bowl-shaped flowers are often pollinated by bees and intellectuallychallenged insects such as beetles. Queen Anne s Lace

17 Dogwood Flowers The actual flowers are the small yellow ones in the center. The white petals are bracts.

18 Tube-shaped Flowers Tube-shaped flowers attract pollinators with long mouthparts such as butterflies, moths, hummingbirds and bees. Nectar is produced deep in the flower forcing the pollinator to touch the pollen-bearing stamens and the pistils. Blazing Star with Skipper Ivy-leafed Morning Glory

19 Little Brown Jugs These strange, fleshy brown flowers grow right on the ground. They are pollinated by a type of fungus gnat.

20 Ground Ivy Gullet flowers Pink Turtlehead Gullet flowers are visited by largebodied insects like bumblebees. Sharp-winged Monkeyflower

21 Pea Family Flowers Redbud Standard Keel Wings Pea flowers have petals called the standard, keel, and 2 wings. The pistil and stamens are enclosed in the keel. It takes a fairly intelligent pollinator, such as a bee, to enter the flower and pollinate it. Clammy Locust

22 White Clover is also a member of the Pea Family. When each individual white flower is pollinated, it turns brownish-pink and falls down, the flower s way of telling the bees it has been pollinated. Clover

23 Orchids Some orchids have flowers that work as a maze for a bee to go through to pick up pollen. Pink Lady s Slipper

24 Separation of the Sexes! - Monoecious Flowers Staminate flowers Pachysandra is a plant that has pistillate flowers and staminate flowers on the same stalk. Pistillate flower

25 Maple Tree flowers Female (these will turn into the helicopters ) Male (these fall off the tree and make a mess on the ground)

26 Maybe this Jack-in-the-Pulpit is actually a Jack-in-the-Pulpit plants are dioecious, the flowers are either male or female. These plants can change gender from year to year depending on their health. It takes more energy to produce fruits and seeds and less energy to just produce pollen. Female plants usually have 2 leaves, male plants usually have 1 leaf. Jill!

27 This IS a Jack! Staminate flowers in the spadix Note the staminate flowers at the base of the Jack (spadix). These tiny flowers produce pollen. The hood is called the spathe; Jack is a spadix.

28 This is a JILL! The pistillate flowers are at the base of the spadix. These will become red berries in the fall if they are pollinated. Pistillate flowers on the spadix

29 Self-pollinating flowers Violet Some flowers are able to pollinate themselves! Violets have closed, often hidden, flowers called cleistogamous flowers that selfpollinate. Dandelions also selfpollinate. Dandelion

30 Floral Oddities Saprophytes are plants that contain no chlorophyll, the green pigment responsible for photosynthesis. These wildflowers, called Indian Pipes, break down decaying leaves for nutrients.

31 Parasites Dodder is a parasitic plant that also contains no chlorophyll. The small teeth, called haustoria sink into the host plant to obtain nutrients.

32 Bear s Ex-Lax! This parasitic earlybloomer, called Squawroot, is sought out by black bears to eat when they emerge from hibernation. They use it as a type of laxative!

33 Oneflowered Cancer Root is parasitic on the roots of other plants. They have no leaves. One-Flowered Cancer Root

34 End of Presentation Return to: or